


The Lambda Quadrant

by Peapods



Category: Pundit RPF, Pundit RPF (US), Star Trek
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-24
Updated: 2010-11-24
Packaged: 2017-10-13 08:40:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/135331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peapods/pseuds/Peapods
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She knows she shouldn't be in the galaxy's most notorious gay bar--notorious because it's one of the only places, besides Orion, that unabashedly accepts and promotes the wearing of silver lamé trousers and white patent leather go-go boots, even together--in her uniform, but twenty minutes ago she had seriously only come in because it was the only place open at thirteen A.M, planet time, on a Wednesday, Earth time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Lambda Quadrant

The bald woman has been staring at Rachel's legs for the past twenty minutes. She knows she shouldn't be in the galaxy's most notorious gay bar--notorious because it's one of the only places, besides Orion, that unabashedly accepts and promotes the wearing of silver lamé trousers and white patent leather go-go boots, even together--in her uniform, but twenty minutes ago she had seriously only come in because it was the only place open at thirteen A.M, planet time, on a Wednesday, Earth time.

And she really had to pee.

"I'll just be a sec," she told her increasingly constipated looking first officer. "Seriously, I don't think I can hold it."

And she flounced--his word, she never "flounced," she was a Captain, dammit--into the bar to wait in the interminable line for the toilets.

"Love your outfit," bald woman finally says to her.

"Thanks very much," Rachel says, trying not to laugh.

"Come here often?"

She really has to hold in the snort at a line that has been a cliche pick-up line on every planet that ever invented the bar pick-up since time began.

"Oh, you know," she says noncommittally. "When I get the chance."

"Well, my friend has been staring at you since you got here and would really like to buy you a drink when you're, uh, done here," Rachel's eyebrows raise.

"Friend?"

Bald woman smiles, eerily bright, "Over by the bar. Purple hair."

Purple haired girl is gorgeous. Hair short, not as short as Rachel's but tousled while looking completely purposeful. Rachel lets herself smile because she's also looking straight at Rachel.

"We'll see," she tells bald woman as she enters the vacated bathroom. She doesn't really wanna sit on anything. The Lambda Quadrant is notorious for a _bit_ more than fashions better left to the... brighter parts of the galaxy and while she's not known for prudishness--she's even had bathroom encounters, well, encounter, singular, anyway. She gathers her uniform skirt and squats inelegantly, grimacing at herself in the unfortunately positioned mirror.

Outside, bald woman is nowhere to be seen and purple-haired woman is sitting lonesome with one half-full Cardassian Sunrise and one full, nearly frosty martini. Rachel vaguely considers her first officer, but shrugs and sidles up with her best smile, sliding on to the stool next to her.

"This has to be for me. No one else would dare drink something as prosaic as vodka in a place where it's possible for the drinks to be more colorful than the outfits."

"Alas, it's gin," the woman says, teeth glowing with the after-effects of the Cardassian Sunrise. Rachel has seen the morning after many Cardassian Sunrises. The glowing teeth were the only part that didn't end in tears.

"Alas," Rachel shrugs and sips it anyway.

"You're Starfleet?"

"Captain of the USS Bill of Rights," she proudly states. "She's no Enterprise, I grant you, but you're a lot less likely to get shot when you beam down in red, so I call it a win."

Purple laughs as though she gets the joke and maybe she does. She might be human. Some species are very human looking and very not human in other ways.

"I'm Ana Marie," she says, offering a hand.

"Rachel," she offers. "How did you know about the drink?"

"You look pretty no nonsense. And it was either that or a shot of Maker's, which I couldn't justify to myself as anything other than a gateway to getting in your pants."

"Forward, aren't you?" Rachel asks, refreshingly surprised.

"I basically had a friend talk you up and send you over here, I figure after that I'm pretty transparent."

"Jesus Christ, Rachel, you would talk someone up in a gay bar in the middle of nowhere when you're supposed to be on a mission," Keith says irritably as he fights his way through grope-y young boys and jealous old bears. "No, I do _not_ want to take you home or bend you over anything," he tells one thoroughly trashed, enterprising soul.

Rachel is laughing, because she has to and because Keith Olbermann in a gay bar, _this_ gay bar, is about the funniest image since Anderson learned that the Spice Girls Reunion Tour had not been the real ladies, but robots tooled to look like them. They hated making him sad but the drooping antennae were pretty amusing.

"Relax, Keith, I'm just having a drink with Ana here," she smiles and winks at the other woman who unabashedly winks back and they share a laugh as though they already have a friendship's worth of inside jokes.

"Yes, alcohol, right before we go meet the informant on the trade minister. This is just the best idea ever."

"Please, it's not as if I'm Anderson. I can handle a little gin."

"And she could have slipped something in there in order to handle _you_."

"Ana, are you planning on drugging me and dragging me back to your lair to ravish me? 'Cause if I didn't have this thing, I would _totally_ be up for that."

"And here I was thinking all I'd need is a wink and a smile."

"That works more often than you'd think," Keith grumbles. "Captain?"

"Can I get your, um, frequency? You have a personal comm?" She hates that duty is calling, but after this little mission they've got two whole days of downtime and she absolutely plans to take advantage of them. Ana passes Rachel the pertinent information, giggling at the apoplexy on Keith's face when Rachel downs the rest of the martini with a gulp. "I'll call ya!"

"Looking forward to it!"

A pulsating, gyrating, pounding, swirling, glittery version of "I'm Coming Out" fades in over the previous song, and Rachel laughs her way out of the bar, because that sort of the thing is just the _norm_ at the Lambda Quadrant. Maybe, in others parts of the galaxy, sexuality has faded into just one of those things. "Oh, you're gay? Well, I'm a Bolian." But here is a place where difference is still proclaimed with exuberance and fun and without fear. Laden with the histories of struggle and hiding and denying, maybe it was a good thing not to forget. Maybe it was a good thing to say "I'm different" and not have to say anything after that. Because "after that" could only be defensive and many had learned that everyone was different and that normal didn't exist and hey, wasn't life _so much more fun_ that way?

The bouncer smacks Keith soundly on the ass as they leave which only prolongs her snickering.

"We have to come back here," she announces. "And not just because I'm pretty sure, in the corner, I spotted a mechanical bull."

"Just, for God's sake, can I _not_ be with you for the return trip?"

"Only if I can take Anderson with me."

"Fine! Give him a chance to wear those godawful pants in the back of the closet, but seriously--"

"Yeah, yeah, no glitter for you," she says as they stroll to their appointed meeting place.


End file.
